Marketing: Reviews and Reviewers

[JustinB]

Let's put together a semi-comprehensive list of places and people that a new game should be reviewed by. If this has already been done and I missed it in my searching, feel free to delete me or whatever.
Okay, so here's what I've seen/come up with by myself, sad as it is:

Ken Hite
RPGnet
ENWorld (D20 only)
The Forge

[Levi Kornelsen]

C.W.Richeson (typically ON RPGnet).

[Matt Wilson]

Let's put together a semi-comprehensive list of places and people that a new game should be reviewed by.

Can folks who post people and places offer some support as to why any given person or place is on the list. "People who can review your games" is different from "people who should review your games."

[iago]

Specific Individuals

I'll elaborate on the specifics alrady mentioned here.

Ken Hite -- He's a known name in the industry, and his Out of the Box column is fairly high-profile.  You need to send him a physical copy of the game, but he's very interested in making sure he uses OotB to make sure folks are aware of indie games.  Like any good reviewer, there's no guarantee of a *good* review; he'll be brisk, and he'll be unvarnished, but he will get your game out to a nicely wide audience.  Knows how to craft a strong "sound-bite", e.g., "Don't Rest Your Head makes Call of Cthulhu's sanity death spiral look like a handful of baby asprin."

C. W. Richeson -- A prolific, very reliable RPG.net reviewer.  Friend to the small press.  Very approachable.  Frequents many a forum, and will even try to get his RPG.net reviews listed on other sites as well if he thinks it'll help the product.  Unvarnished but very, very thorough in his reviews.  Also requires a physical copy of the product.  Probably my top choice to review any game I produce if I want a RPG.net review.

Judd Karlman -- Judd (Paka on RPG.net, author of Dictionary of Mu) has a very active game community around him, has a tendency to post a lot, and knows his shit when it comes to talking actual play.  I think of him as a nexus of play rather than a reviewer, but it's been really awesome to have gotten games picked up by the Ithaca crew.  They chat about what happens at their table a lot, and that offers up a very strong grassroots presence for your games when they start playing them.

Chad Underkoffler -- He doesn't have a lot of bandwidth for it, but he does blog on his LJ, does have a solid readership, and does these nice, compact mini-reviews called "Underkoffler's Overviews" that'll break your game down into the good and the bad in succinct ways that tell folks what things about your game might make them want to buy it.

Groups/Classes of Reviewers to Consider

Regular Gamers Who Post On Highly Public Sites -- It's something of a truism in the small press community that Actual Play Sells Games.  This has definitely matched up with my experience -- so long as the folks who do the actual play post in a fairly public way -- RPG.net's AP forum, Story-Games, their own blogs if they're read widely enough, their own podcasts if they've got a large enough listenership.  Whenever possible, thank folks who post about actual play of your game and encourage them to post it in as public a place as they're comfortable.  Engage them in becoming a part of your game's success.

Industry Names Who You Dig -- We sent a copy of Spirit of the Century to Bruce Baugh, telling him "dude, this is our love letter to Adventure!.  Thanks so much for makiing that game."  First off, that made him happy.  And then he read the game, and started talking about it -- a lot.  This is sort of an extension of the Ken Hite thing.  Find folks who are the reason why you got into gaming, and figure out if they're bloggers.  If they are, they have readers.  Make use of that by contacting those dudes and telling them how they've changed your gaming life, how they've inspired you, and why you'd like to thank them by sending them free product.  Last year's GenCon gave me an opportunity to do this with Robin Laws and Don't Rest Your Head, also to good effect.  But these don't always have to be HUGE NAMES like Hite or Laws.  You're surrounded by guys and gals who could dig your game, right here.  Talk with them about it!  Early on, John Harper said a lot of things about Spirit of the Century that were awesome, and I think it helped raise awareness of SOTC as a solid indie game for indie game designers.  In the end, this is about finding the various niches in gaming and getting someone who lives there hooked on, or at least interested in reading, your game.

[C.W.Richeson]

Dan Davenport at RPG.net is, in my book, the best RPG reviewer out there.  It's his writing style - it's easy going, funny, and has resulted in a lot of folk actively seeking out Dan's reviews even if they aren't initially interested in the game he's reviewing.  His reviews are also very comprehensive.  If I published a game tomorrow he would be the first person I'd ask for a review.

I want to mention someone else who is just starting out but who has a lot of promise as a reviewer.  Kurt Wiegel.  Kurt posts well done video reviews on YouTube that hit the highlights and coolest parts of a game in about 5 minutes.  Kurt's only done 8 episodes so far, each episode encompassing one game, but the production quality is high for a work of this type.  The book gets visually shown off, and that's something you don't see with other types of reviews.  I understand he'll be reviewing a few indie games in the near future, so definitely worth keeping an eye on.  You can find his reviews here.

[JustinB]

What kind of viewership does he have?

[iago]

What kind of viewership does he have?

Depends on how long the video's been out there.  There are 8 reviews; the most recent has less than 200 on it, but the first one has crested over 1000 views.

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=pugknowspro